Jewelry articles, such as pendants and charms having moveable appendages, are known, and such articles, having the form of various animals with movable head, arm and leg appendages are particularly popular. Such articles are relatively small, are typically cast of precious or semiprecious metals and have a main body or torso cast as a hollow member and wherein the appendages such as the head, arms and legs, may also be hollow or solid cast parts.
The attraction or appeal of animal charms or pendants and similar jewelry articles is enhanced if the article appendages have some degree of universal or omnidirectional movement relative to the article body. However, the fabrication and assembly of such articles can be rather difficult due to the physical size of the articles and the requirement for proper retention of the moveable appendages with respect to the main body or torso of the article. For example, the overall height or length of a charm or pendant in the form of an animal may typically be less than about 1.0 inches and the length of the appendages may be no more than 0.25 inches.
Efforts have been attempted in the prior art to develop suitable connections between the main body part of a charm or pendant and the moveable appendages therefor. However, the complexity of the assembly process in accordance with certain prior art designs, including designs which require multiple solder joints and connections which place undue stress on the joint members has created a need for an improved joint connection between the appendages and the main body member of animal charms or pendants, as well as similar jewelry articles, which have interconnected parts which are moveable relative to each other. One such improvement is disclosed and claimed in my co-pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/149,936, filed Sep. 9, 1998 and assigned to the assignee of the present invention. However, there has been a desire and need to provide an animal charm or pendant or similar jewelry article having, as a novelty feature, one or more appendages connected to a main body or torso and wherein the appendages are somewhat universally or omnidirectionally moveable relative to the torso.
Accordingly, the present invention overcomes the disadvantages of certain prior art joint connections between parts of jewelry articles, such as animal form pendants and charms, while providing at least limited universal or omnidirectional movement between the parts forming the joint and while also meeting substantially all of the desiderata of a reliable and easily fabricated joint connection for such items.